Accused from a 'broad strata' of society
GREGORY BONNELL
Canadian Press
From an unmarried computer programmer to a university health sciences graduate and the unemployed, the 17 suspects charged in a foiled terrorist plot represent a “broad strata” of Canadian society.
“Some are students, some are employed, some are unemployed,” RCMP assistant Commissioner Mike McDonell said Saturday.
Family members wept as the 17 accused, five of whom were youths at the time of the alleged crimes and cannot be named, were brought into a Brampton courtroom in small groups, handcuffed and shackled at the feet.
One woman broke down, saying her son was yet to appear but that she was upset at the sight of his friends in custody.
Most of the group, who were remanded into custody until their next court appearance on Tuesday, wore street clothes although some appeared in white jump suits.
The majority sported the traditional Muslim male beard.
Alvin Chand, brother of Toronto suspect Steven Vikash Chand, scoffed at the charges outside the courthouse.
“He's not a terrorist, come on, he's a Canadian citizen” Mr. Chand said of his brother. “The people that were arrested are good people. They go to the mosque. They go to school, go to college.”
Aly Hindy, an imam at the Salaheddin Islamic Centre in nearby Scarborough, said the centre's mosque had been monitored by security agencies for years. He said Muslims were once again being falsely accused.
“It's not terrorism. It could be some criminal activity with a few guys, that's all,” said Mr. Hindy.
“We are the ones always accused.”
Rocco Galati, lawyer for two suspects from Mississauga, said his client Ahmad Ghany, 21, is a health sciences graduate from McMaster University in Hamilton. He was born in Canada, the son of a medical doctor who emigrated from Trinidad and Tobago in 1955.
Mr. Galati said neither of his clients have criminal records and are both “model citizens.”
“Both of their families are very well-established professionals, well-established families, no criminal pasts whatsoever,” Mr. Galati said. “That's why we're anxious to see the particulars of the allegations against them.”
The father of accused Shareef Abdelhaleen, a 30-year-old computer programmer from nearby Mississauga, said the charges made no sense.
“I am shocked,” said the Egyptian immigrant who came to Canada with his son 20 years ago and is an engineer on contract with Atomic Energy of Canada.
“It's crazy. It has no meaning whatsoever.”
The senior Abdelhaleen also confirmed that he posted bail for Mohammad Mahjoub who is currently in Kingston, Ont., on a national security certificate.
The middle-class east-end Toronto neighbourhood that terror suspect Steven Chand calls home is filled with children, lined with two-storey homes and rich green, well-maintained lawns.
Area resident Casey Grenier, 32, stood with two neighbours enjoying a beer on a porch next door to Chand's residence were unmarked cars and police officers were parked.
“It's a real quiet neighbourhood,” Grenier said. “You get up in the morning and you hear the crickets chirping.”
Grenier said police pulled up at the residence around 4 p.m. with forensics trucks and a SWAT team and blocked off the street. Police were seen by neighbours leaving the residence carrying sealed Ziploc bags containing unspecified items.
Neighbours said Chand, also known as Abdul Shakur, rented a basement apartment in the home, owned by Mohammad Attique, a father of five.
Attique operated an Islamic bookstore from the home, but neighbours drew up a petition last year calling for the business to be shut down because it was being operated in a residential neighbourhood.
Residents of a Mississauga, Ont., neighbourhood knew little about Zakaria Amara, 20. Neighbours said he was an in-law of the family who lived at the home.
Neighbours said the family, a mother and her three daughters, had lived there for two years. They had not noticed a male figure in the house.
Tony Sbrocchi, 38, a neighbourhood resident for 10 years said he saw individuals backing a U-Haul into the driveway of the residence and loading up the vehicle on Monday, and that a group of three unfamiliar males left the next morning.
“It was very suspicious,” Sbrocchi said, adding that he was unsure of what was being loading into the truck.
While the RCMP said suspects Mohammed Dirie, 22, and Yasim Abdi Mohamed, 24, were from Kingston, Ont., members of the city's Muslim community were at a loss as to who the men were and what they were doing in this eastern Ontario city.
“I have been asking around and no one seems to know them,” Hafizur Rahman, president of the Islamic Centre of Kingston told the Ottawa Sun.
Taking into consideration the men's ages, Rahman told the Sun they may be students at Queen's University.
However, Haseeb Khan, president of the Muslim Students' Association at Queen's, also didn't recognize the men's names.
After asking members of his executive and several students at the school Saturday, he was still unsure whether they attend the university.
“We don't seem to know those people at all,” he said.
Also charged are Fahim Ahmad, 21, of Toronto; Asad Ansari, 21, of Mississauga; Qayyum Abdul Jamal, 43, of Mississauga; Jahmaal James, 23, of Toronto; Amin Mohamed Durrani, 19, of Toronto; and Saad Khalid, 19, of Mississauga.
With files from AP |
